What Makes Modern STP Plants More Cost Effective?
As the population increases and with increased industrialization, proper handling and disposal of the wastewater has become a major issue both to the towns and the rural areas. Sewage treatment plants are very significant in the management and treatment of effluent through the process, which aims at removing any pollutant and contaminants from the water. Such plants have however developed with time, and the presently existing sewage treatment plants are much more economical than the older ones. In this blog, we will talk about what can provide these plants with such a competitive advantage.
Energy Efficiency
An essential aspect that makes modern sewage treatment plants relatively cheap to operate is their energy efficiency. Conventional wastewater treatment structures needed a lot of input energy to carry out their processes, and this led to high expenses. But contemporary sewage treatment systems are built to be energy-friendly employing various techniques that help in conserving energy.
Some of the technologies employed in modern sewage treatment plants to achieve energy efficiency include:
a) Aerobic Digestion: In this process, oxygen reduces organic contents into basic components by burning them and in the process generates Biogas that is used in power production. The biogas can be used directly in other to power the plant, it can also be converted to electricity.
b) Membrane Bioreactors (MBRs): These systems integrate the conventional activated sludge process with the filtration technology, and therefore they entail minimal use of energy for aeration. MBRs generate high quality permeate, hence the water produced is perfect for use in irrigation or any other application other than drinking.
c) Anaerobic Ammonium Oxidation (anammox): This process, known as the anoxic oxidation of ammonia by bacteria, may take far less energy than the traditional alternatives for nitrogen removal. The anammox process is specifically effective for wastewater with high ammonia content and from industries.
Modern Treatment Procedures
Recent or contemporary STPs employ treatment technologies that make it possible to produce effluent that can be reused in different aspects of life. These technologies are therefore appropriate in the plant as they minimize the flow of wastewater that would require disposal thus, they are cheap.
Some of the advanced treatment technologies used in modern sewage treatment plants include:
a) Membrane Filtration: Special processes like ultra filtration, nano filtration and reverse osmosis, can filter particles dissolved solids and organic matters to produce effluents of high quality. This effluent can also be recycled for purposes like gardening, washing, or even drinking, therefore greatly cutting down the requirements for clean water sources.
b) Advanced Oxidation Processes (AOPs): AOPs apply oxidants, very active species like hydroxyl radicals, that ‘attack’ organic pollutants in a solution. These process, thus, can bring high pollutant removal efficiencies, especially for situations where they do not require additional chemical inputs compared to the other standard chemical treatment processes.
c) Biological Nutrient Removal (BNR): BNR processes like the ENR process applies select microbial cultures to remove nitrogen and phosphorus from the wastewater. This is due to the fact that through attaining high N and P removal efficiencies by BNR processes, the discharge quality of the treated waste water is improved and the need for secondary treatments or discharge upgrades significantly limited.
Modularity and the Capacity of Scaling
Today’s modular and scalable systems of sewage treatment plants ensure that they can be easily expanded or modified with the increase in wastewater flow rates and or treatment needs. This has the effect of enabling the operators to tailor their treatment processes according to their needs and thereby save on costs.
These approaches also allow plant operators to select the best technology suited for their processes instead of being limited by the use of general technologies. For instance, small scale plantmay not need high level of nutrient removal compared to large scale plantmay not have same nutrients removal requirement while that plant which serves industrial areas may need treatment for specificpollutants.
Automation and Remote Monitoring of Assets
Through the application of automation and remote monitoring technologies into the current sewage treatment plants the costs of running the plants are cut. Such complex processes as the control of aeration and mixing can be best implemented through automation to allow plant operators to get the best of the plant in terms of treatment efficiency and power usage.
Supervisory control systems allow plant operators to monitor the efficiency of their treatment processes in real time so as to quickly detect any anomalies. This decreases the demand for human resources in facility where tests are being conducted as well as reduces the time that tests are being conducted thus cutting down the operational costs.
Waste to Energy as well as Resource Recycling
Sewage treatment plants in the contemporary world not only remove the wastewater but also reclaim useful products and energy as well. This waste to energy and resource recovery approach greatly reduces the overall cost of wastewater management by providing new value to the waste in terms of energy and revenue.
Some of the waste-to-energy and resource recovery technologies used in modern sewage treatment plants include:
a) Biogas Production: The aerobic digestion process results in the production of biogas that can be utilized for fuel or electricity generation. The use of such technology does not only save energy needed for operation of the plant, but also generates revenue for the plant operator.
b) Sludge Drying and Incineration: Sewage sludge can be dried or incinerated and the result can be used for fuel or as a fertilizer. When energy from sludge is recycled the total cost of managing wastes is lower because the operator of the waste management plant gets extra income from the sale of the recovered products.
c) Resource Recovery: However, innovative sewage treatment plants do not just get energy from the wastewater; but also other valuable resources which includes phosphorus and nitrogen. They can be used in a number of industrial uses or for agriculture which adds another stream of revenue for the plant operator.
Conclusion
Modern sewage treatment plants are comparatively costlier today as they are not energy efficient, do not incorporate the latest treatment process principles, are not modular in structure, highly manual, and lack waste-to-energy and resource recovery features. By implementing these novel strategies, the operator can slash the undertakings cost of wastewater treatment and retain a high level of removal efficiency. Over the time, it is believed that further advancements will be made increasing the efficiency further and thus the future sewage treatment plants will be cheaper and therefore make the solution the best method of treating the wastewater.
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